France would be deploying 7,000 soldiers across the country to increase security after a teacher was brutally stabbed and three other people wounded in a school attack by a former student.
According to the President’s office, the suspect might be of Islamic radicalization.
Counterterrorism authorities are investigating the stabbing, and the suspected attacker and several others are in custody, prosecutors said.
Court documents viewed by The Associated Press show that the suspect is from the Ingushetia region in Russia’s Caucasus Mountains, which neighbors Chechnya.
President Emmanuel Macron mandated up to 7,000 soldiers deployed by Monday night and until further notice to tighten security and vigilance around France, his office said.
At the school Saturday morning, police stood guard as adults and children arrived.
Classes were canceled for the day, but the school opened its doors to those parents and students who wanted to find support.
A mother came to seek guidance from counselors about how to support her two sons, who witnessed the attack in their schoolyard.
“As adults, we are managing with difficulty to take a step back, but for them, they’re children,” said Emily Noge, arriving at the school with her sons and partner.
‘’They initially thought it was an exercise, so keeping things separate, to say that we’ve passed from an exercise to something dramatic, is very tricky for them.”
‘’It’s always the same moments that come back: The schoolyard, the chairs to protect themselves, the stabbings, the whys. ‘Why us? Why Arras? Why the teachers? They were good teachers. They were there to protect us,”’ she said.
The suspect was detained Thursday for questioning based on the monitoring of his phone calls in recent days, but investigators found nothing relating to the attack.
Prosecutors are considering charges of terrorism-related murder and attempted murder against the suspect.
